The Paradise Mystery eBook

replying to his assistant’s greeting—­a
greeting as quiet as his entrance—­he went
on reading his letters, and Bryce turned off to that
part of the surgery in which the drugs were kept,
and busied himself in making up some prescription.
Ten minutes went by in silence; then Ransford pushed
his correspondence aside, laid a paper-weight on it,
and twisting his chair round, looked at the man to
whom he was going to say some unpleasant things.
Within himself he was revolving a question—­how
would Bryce take it?

He had never liked this assistant of his, although
he had then had him in employment for nearly two years.
There was something about Pemberton Bryce which he
did not understand and could not fathom. He
had come to him with excellent testimonials and good
recommendations; he was well up to his work, successful
with patients, thoroughly capable as a general practitioner—­there
was no fault to be found with him on any professional
grounds. But to Ransford his personality was
objectionable—­why, he was not quite sure.
Outwardly, Bryce was rather more than presentable—­a
tall, good-looking man of twenty-eight or thirty,
whom some people—­women especially—­would
call handsome; he was the sort of young man who knows
the value of good clothes and a smart appearance,
and his professional manner was all that could be desired.
But Ransford could not help distinguishing between
Bryce the doctor and Bryce the man—­and
Bryce the man he did not like. Outside the professional
part of him, Bryce seemed to him to be undoubtedly
deep, sly, cunning—­he conveyed the impression
of being one of those men whose ears are always on
the stretch, who take everything in and give little
out. There was a curious air of watchfulness
and of secrecy about him in private matters which
was as repellent—­to Ransford’s thinking—­as
it was hard to explain. Anyway, in private affairs,
he did not like his assistant, and he liked him less
than ever as he glanced at him on this particular occasion.

“I want a word with you,” he said curtly.
“I’d better say it now.”

Bryce, who was slowly pouring some liquid from one
bottle into another, looked quietly across the room
and did not interrupt himself in his work. Ransford
knew that he must have recognized a certain significance
in the words just addressed to him—­but
he showed no outward sign of it, and the liquid went
on trickling from one bottle to the other with the
same uniform steadiness.

“Yes?” said Bryce inquiringly. “One
moment.”

He finished his task calmly, put the corks in the
bottles, labelled one, restored the other to a shelf,
and turned round. Not a man to be easily startled—­not
easily turned from a purpose, this, thought Ransford
as he glanced at Bryce’s eyes, which had a trick
of fastening their gaze on people with an odd, disconcerting
persistency.

“I’m sorry to say what I must say,”
he began. “But—­you’ve
brought it on yourself. I gave you a hint some
time ago that your attentions were not welcome to
Miss Bewery.”